“I have no doubt of it,” I answered.

“The Vicomtesse is as handsome as a queen this morning,” he continued, paying no heed to this remark.  “She has on a linen dress that puzzles me.  It was made to walk among the trees and flowers, it is as simple as you please; and yet it has a distinction that makes you stare.”

“You seem to have stared,” I answered.  “Since when did you take such interest in gowns?”

“Bless you, it was Antoinette.  I never should have known,” said he.  “Antoinette had never before seen the gown, and she asked the Vicomtesse where she got the pattern.  The Vicomtesse said that the gown had been made by Leonard, a court dressmaker, and it was of the fashion the Queen had set to wear in the gardens of the Trianon when simplicity became the craze.  Antoinette is to have it copied, so she says.”

Which proved that Antoinette was human, after all, and happy once more.

“Hang it,” said Nick, “she paid more attention to that gown than to me.  Good-by, Davy.  Obey the—­the Colonel.”

“Is—­is not the Vicomtesse going with you?” I asked

“No, I’m sorry for you,” he called back from the gallery.

He had need to be, for I fell into as great a fright as ever I had had in my life.  Monsieur de St. Gre knocked at the door and startled me out of my wits.  Hearing that I was awake, he had come in person to make his excuses for leaving me that morning.

“Bon Dieu!” he said, looking at me, “the country has done you good already.  Behold a marvel!  Au revoir, David.”

I heard the horses being brought around, and laughter and voices.  How easily I distinguished hers!  Then I heard the hoof-beats on the soft dirt of the drive.  Then silence,—­the silence of a summer morning which is all myriad sweet sounds.  Then Lindy appeared, starched and turbaned.

“Marse Dave, how you feel dis mawnin’?  Yo’ ’pears mighty peart, sholy.  Marse Dave, yo’ chair is sot on de gallery.  Is you ready?  I’ll fotch dat yaller nigger, Andre.”

“You needn’t fetch Andre,” I said; “I can walk.”

“Lan sakes, Marse Dave, but you is bumptious.”

I rose and walked out on the gallery with surprising steadiness.  A great cushioned chair had been placed there and beside it a table with books, and another chair.  I sat down.  Lindy looked at me sharply, but I did not heed her, and presently she retired.  The day, still in its early golden glory, seemed big with prescience.  Above, the saffron haze was lifted, and there was the blue sky.  The breeze held its breath; the fragrance of grass and fruit and flowers, of the shrub that vied with all, languished on the air.  Out of these things she came.

I knew that she was coming, but I saw her first at the gallery’s end, the roses she held red against the white linen of her gown.  Then I felt a great yearning and a great dread.  I have seen many of her kind since, and none reflected so truly as she the life of the old regime.  Her dress, her carriage, her air, all suggested it; and she might, as Nick said, have been walking in the gardens of the Trianon.  Titles I cared nothing for.  Hers alone seemed real, to put her far above me.  Had all who bore them been as worthy, titles would have meant much to mankind.